Brute Force

Chapter 2

Yaqub Feng lay on his stomach in the cramped belly of the swaying jingle bus, crammed between his brother and Jiàn Zŏu, the ratlike Chinese snakehead. Ehmet had taken the spot along the outside edge where he could press his face to the metal grating where he could see out and get some semblance of breathable air. Jiàn Zŏu had a similar position and view, but wedged in the middle, Yaqub could see only shadows and choked on the dust that sifted up through the cracks in the wooden floor.

A riot of sound and color on the outside, the brightly decorated bus looked like something out of a gypsy caravan. Lengths of dragging chain and countless tinkling bells hung along the bumpers and painted trim of the gaudy monstrosity that had a permit to take tourists across the border with China and up the Karakoram Highway as far as Karakul Lake. It was the perfect vehicle in which to hide in order to get out of Pakistan — for who in his right mind would hide in something that already drew so much attention?

“It would be much easier if we went out through Afghanistan,” Jiàn Zŏu said, sounding hollow, as if he’d been kicked in the groin.

“My business is in Kashgar,” Ehmet muttered, still studying the situation outside the truck through tiny holes in the metal flashing. “I already told you that. It will not take long.”

“In Pakistan,” Jiàn Zŏu said, “you are merely fugitives. In China you are human targets. Forgive me, but it seems foolish to walk straight into the mouth of the dragon when the Afghan border is as porous as a rusted bucket.”

Yaqub felt Ehmet’s body tense. He lifted his head enough to turn and face the center of the truck. The sight of dried blood caking the corners of his mouth was terrifying, even to Yaqub.

“Tell me, Jiàn Zŏu,” Ehmet whispered. “Did we accompany you out of Dera Ismail Khan prison, or did you accompany us?”

“I am with you,” the Chinese man said. “And happy to be so. But it would make it much easier to do my job if you told me your final destination.”

Ehmet’s face remained neutral, as if he was passing judgment. “You should concern yourself with our immediate destination — and that is Kashgar.”

“As you wish,” Jiàn Zŏu said. “I do have contacts there who will help us move about. When you are ready, I will make the necessary arrangements.”

Ehmet turned to peer out the grating again. “The guards are waving all the buses through, just as you told us they would.”

“Money and blood grease the gears of this world,” the snakehead said. “The drivers pay the guards well to let them pass unmolested.”

Brakes and springs squawked as the jingle truck lurched forward, sending up a cloud of dust through the floorboards that threatened to choke the three men.

Above them, wealthy passengers from Islamabad and other affluent cities snapped photographs and gasped at the vistas of the Pamir Mountains. These men and a small number of women, each with a respectable male escort, sipped tea and chatted nervously about caravan thieves on the old Silk Road, ignorant of the fact that three fugitives hid in the hollow floor just inches beneath their feet.

From the time the first explosion had rocked the prison, Yaqub had felt caught up in a terrible, unstoppable wave. Stunned at the loss of their leader, Ali Kadir’s men had ushered them quickly away from Dera Ismail Khan in an old Mercedes van, heading northeast along the Indus River. They had changed to a sedan in Rawalpindi, and then switched vehicles again in Abbottabad, this time to a large panel truck that carried a load of goats. Whatever the plan had been beyond that, it had died with Ali Kadir. In Abbottabad, the men seemed unsure of what to do next. Jiàn Zŏu had told them to go to Nagar where he said he had a contact. They reached the small village before daybreak.

Jiàn Zŏu had met with his contact, who’d shown them inside the jingle bus an hour before the first tourists arrived. It would be cramped to the point of crippling, he said, but under the present state of security in the country, drastic measures were a necessity. The bold and bloody escape had been a devastating blow to Pakistan in the court of public opinion — making the Feng brothers two of the most wanted men in the world.

Ehmet raised his head. “Do your contacts in Kashgar have food?” he said, loud enough to startle Yaqub, though there was no danger anyone above could hear him over the rattling jingle bus.

“Food?” Jiàn Zŏu stifled a cough amid the swirl of road dust.

“Yes, food.” Ehmet nodded. “I have had nothing to eat since I snacked on Afaz the Biter.”